


No King but the Queen of the North

by Anenchantmentoffemmes



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Emotional Baggage, F/M, Fae Courts, Sansa and Margaery are best friends who used to fuck, Slow Burn, Winterfell, everyone is a fae, ex-lovers to lovers?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-12
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-11-02 03:44:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20611184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anenchantmentoffemmes/pseuds/Anenchantmentoffemmes
Summary: Fae AUWinter is coming.At every change of the season, the Fae send ambassadors to the court about to take control, but this cycle, Bran decides to send Tyrion instead.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Season 8 happened centuries ago, and everyone is immortal so I can just pretend the age gap never existed. Also, Margaery is alive because it's my fanfic and I said so.

“Winter is coming,” Bran’s voice was quiet. Three-eyed Raven or no, his vocal cords were still those of a fae, musical, soft, not at all suited to his position as resident master of foreboding and brooding.

The clearest sign of his change into the Raven being the accent of the Winter courts falling away as the seasons did. Tyrion hadn’t noticed its absence until he realized how much he had missed it.

Fae from the Summer court had voices spun from sunshine, settling into your mind like strawberry wine, heady, rich, and so rarely raised. But it was truly Fae from the Autumn court were the most easily distinguished by their voices, and as a child, Tyrion had always scrambled for a reason to be around any that visited. 

Following them, asking questions just to hear their answers, Tyrion would sometimes convince himself he had been meant to be born into that court. A simple misstep that could be remedied any day. Their voices were the death to Spring’s life. All the cracks, wobbles, and flaws swirled together until somehow it became beautiful again. Looking back, it made sense, why he would hope he belonged to them. 

Now he knew better. Both, that he was a Summer fae, and that it was fae from the Winter court that had the most alluring voices. 

His mistake could be forgiven in childhood, as he had never met a fae from the Winter courts. He hadn’t been allowed on diplomatic visits, whether that meant going out to one of the other courts with the rest of his family at the change of a season, or meeting the ambassador from another court when they came to the Summer court. And the Winter court didn’t do friendly visits. 

Even before what happened with Ned, they never were a sociable bunch. 

But even when he finally had been allowed along, and had first met the fae of the Winter courts, he hadn’t liked their voices at first. He had made more mistakes in those days than he would like to remember.

When he had first heard Ned speak, he thought the man sounded almost drowsy. It was a few days before he realized that this was the trick of them. It was not the speaker, but the listener who was being drawn slowly into sleep. 

That was of course, only when their voices were quiet. Growing up in the Summer court that was what he was used to, and what the Stark family had provided him with when he visited their court. The peak of polite dignity, he hadn’t even realized that they had been stifling themselves for him until he first heard one scream. He had never heard a scream before. Even in a crowd with her own hand clamped over her mouth, he had heard Sansa shout for her father just before he died. 

That is when he first discovered he hated the sound. He didn’t know when he began to like it well enough to miss it. But he did, and Bran had scrubbed it away. 

A perfect king for the Summer court. 

His patience was a perfect match for Tyrion’s wandering mind of late. It had used to be Tyrion constantly bringing Bran back to the point, but this time, it was Bran’s voice to snap Tyrion back to reality.

“We have to choose an ambassador.” 

Tyrion’s eyebrows raised. “Your grace, won’t you be visiting your sister?”

That is how it always went. For Spring, and Autumn courts one could send an ambassador to mark the changing of the season, but not for Summer or Winter. Every King and Queen wanted to be there at such a dramatic shift. For it was not just a turn in a dial or an added boost, season changes like this were made for knocking over the chessboard. 

It was the change from Spring to Summer that had finally drawn Ned and his family out to the Summer courts the first time so many centuries ago. 

“Sansa did not come for the Summer ceremony, she won’t mind if I miss Winter’s.” Bran took a sip from his wine. It was an import from the Winter court, though it was only Tyrion who knew that. This was one of the only things Bran hadn’t let go of, and he didn’t want to give him a reason to.

“Your grace, please don’t tell me that you are being spiteful.” Tyrion leaned forward in his chair across the table from Bran.

“No.” Bran placed his glass back upon the table, and moved his wheelchair back, preparing to leave. “You will go in my stead. I have things to attend to here.”

Tyrion scrambled out of his own chair, hurrying to follow Bran as he wheeled towards his quarters. “Surely I can attend to them for you, as I always have.”

“You will have things to attend to there,” Bran told him. His tone was one that Tyrion was learning to hate. The voice of the Three-eyed Raven, no arguments, no matter how clever, could get through to him when he was like this.

Tyrion had long ago decided to give up trying, as he hated being wrong slightly more than he hated following orders without questions. At this moment though, he couldn’t help himself.

“Your grace-”

Before he could even articulate a protest, Bran’s door was being opened for him by his guard, and he was going into his bedroom, the one place in the castle that Bran allowed no other person to enter.

Tyrion was considering trying to manage a couple of words when the heavy oak doors shut in his face.


	2. Queens in the North

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People begin to arrive at the Winter courts.

“Winter is coming.” Margaery’s voice surprised Sansa as she shut the books in front of her.

“Margaery.” If it was any of the other monarchs, Sansa would have hidden the relief in her voice, but as it was, she pushed back her chair and rushed to Margaery, wrapping her arms around the woman. Margaery always made it a point to arrive early, but Sansa found herself surprised every cycle.

A smile hid in the corner of Margaery’s mouth as she greeted Sansa with open arms, as she always did. 

“Sister.” Sansa could not remember which cycle it was that Margaery had started calling her that, but it brought a smile to her face every time she did. 

With Jon North, Arya South, and Bran ruling the Summer court, she didn’t get to hear that title as often as she would like. She assumed Margaery felt the same way with her brother gone, for as soon as Sansa returned the greeting her face lit up.

Stepping back from the hug, Sansa looked Margaery over. She was wearing a cricket green dress, and her hair fell loosely in curls over her shoulders.

Margaery grinned wickedly when she saw Sansa’s eyes stall at the top of her head. “I left it in my quarters. Your servants were kind enough to put my room right next to yours, and I don’t mind if you see me without it.”

Margaery’s crown was a sight to behold. Taking the designs of her first husband’s, and reportedly the metal from her second and third’s, though Sansa had no inkling on how she would have managed that. Regardless, it was a large thing and must have been heavy to carry every day, Sansa couldn't blame her.

She took off her own crown, placing it on the desk to Margaery's widening grin.

"Sit with me, your grace?" Sansa pulled out one of the three chairs at her table, but Margaery ignored it in favour of sitting on her bed.

"Please wait until the others are here before you use formalities. I've been riding with my Lord husband all day, I'm too tired." She leaned back on Sansa's bed, after a few moments she looked up and patted the space beside her. 

Sansa hesitated for only a moment before sitting next to Margaery. 

“It’s been too long.” She smiled at Margaery as the woman tangled their fingers together.

“You say that every cycle, yet you never come to the Spring courts,” Margaery complained, a pout in her voice. 

“There must always be a Stark at Winterfell.” Sansa recited just as she always did. 

“There was a time when the Spring courts were going to be your home, how did you grow to hate them so much?” Margaery prodded, and Sansa’s eyebrows pulled together.

Years ago she would have jumped to assure Margaery, but now she took her time thinking over the woman’s question. “I don’t have the love for warmth that I used to. Winterfell is my home.”

Margaery sat up, pulling Sansa’s hand to her chest. “Forgive me, I didn’t mean to remind you of King Landing. I just mean to say that the Spring court is different, you should see it when it’s our season, there is nothing quite like it.”

Sansa nodded. “I’m sure you’re right, but the Kings of Winterfell don’t often return to Winterfell once we leave.”

“But you are a Queen.” Margaery began to smile again. 

“And King.”

“Yes, I forgot, your refusal to marry.” She teased. “I can’t say I mind, I would hate to share you with anyone.”

Sansa laughed. “I have married, I can’t say I particularly cared for it.”

"I find marriage quite invigorating." Margaery twirled her hair around her finger.

"How is your husband?" Sansa was slightly ashamed to have forgotten him. Her cousin Robin Arryn did try to come visit her with Margaery every cycle and was nothing like he had been so many centuries ago. He also seemed completely determined to be the best husband possible to one of Sansa's dearest friends. 

"My lord husband is doing well." Margaery shrugged in a way she never would have if he was in the room. "He was quite enthusiastic about the trip, the idea of himself as a man of the North seems to have taken root." 

Sansa had picked up as much from his letters, which made her much more confident in what she wanted to do next. She went to the chest at the foot of her bed. "You reminded me, I have something for the two of you."

Margaery brightened, following close behind Sansa. She watched over her shoulder as Sansa dragged out two heavy cloaks.

With thick fur collars, both were delicately embroidered, one had the falcon of Robins house, and the other with golden rose trim all along the bottom, the words "as high as honor" hidden among the vines. 

Margaery's hand first went to her mouth, reaching out to stroke the fur collar of hers with a finger. "I love it."

Sansa had learned throughout their years of friendship that Margaery was perhaps the most clever fae alive. She had twisted and curled around the fact that fae couldn't lie like no one else Sansa had ever met. But such a clear declaration was impossible for her to have hidden another meaning behind, and Sansa let out a soft breath.

"We will truly look like sisters tomorrow." She grabbed Sansa's hand. "You must wear yours as well. Together we will make it seem like there as many Starks in Winterfell as there should be."  
*  
Margaery had been right. Together, Sansa, Robin, and Margaery were quite a sight. Their crowns on their heads, they stood awaiting the arrival of the other courts.

Sansa didn't know if Arya would be coming this cycle. Her visits were often surprises, and her letters infrequent. As the unofficial wandering Queen of the Autumn courts next to Gendry's completely official stable King, it was a gamble, but Sansa was hopeful.

Bran's visits were much more regular but often less satisfying. He would never stay long and seemed to have taken his exit from the Winter courts seriously. A choice that surely made the transition into his place as King of Summer much smoother, but never failed to disappoint Sansa.

It had become a difficult thing to muster up excitements for his visits, and with the uncertainty of Arya’s presence, she found herself most excited to see Gendry. Similar to Margaery, he had become a part of her family, though his connection was much less official and similar to Margaery he was a favourite part of the changing of the cycle. 

He was a calm presence, which was a blessing during the start of Winter.

As much as it was useful for her politically for the Winter courts to come into season, it was an exhausting time. More people came to Winterfell then she ever felt comfortable with, with even the Iron Islands sending a representative that she was expected to take care of.

Just organizing the rooms so that no one would start a fight in the month they were expected to stay, was a task that took weeks of consulting with her advisors to untangle. In a situation like that, Gendry’s extensive experience with keeping Arya out of fights in the Autumn courts was necessary. 

The thought of all the conflicts that she would be expected to resolve in the coming weeks was enough to make her skin itch. But she stood as still as ice, her chin up and gaze directly on the doors, waiting for her attendants to announce the first arrival. 

There were many cycles when the time between the arrival of the Summer and Autumn courts spanned the whole day, so a small knot of tension unwound from between her shoulders when the attendant spoke.

“Introducing the Summer and Autumn courts.” He announced as the heavy oak doors were pushed open.

Though she had tried to temper her expectations, she found herself searching the procession from the Autumn court for Arya, and she couldn’t stop a small grin from touching her lips when she saw her sister. 

Hair cropped short, not even passing her ears, Arya was dressed in almost the same armour as Gendry wore beside her, and Sansa suspected that it was Gendry that had crafted both suits. She watched Arya’s eyes survey the area before catching on hers, and before the attendant even had time to stumble in announcing her and trying to summarize her position in the Autumn courts, Arya was climbing off of her horse and rushing towards Sansa.

If she had been surrounded by Summer fae as she had been all those centuries ago, she was sure one of the guards would have stopped Arya from clamouring up onto the dais and hugging her sister. As it was, the lords and ladies around her just smiled wide. Many of them were probably almost as happy to see Arya as she was.

Sansa wrapped Arya in her arms tightly, forgetting for a moment that the procession from the Summer courts was following just behind.

It was a few moments before Arya let go of Sansa, and it took Sansa just a second longer to release her in turn. 

Straightening as Arya moved to stand with the other lords and ladies of Winterfell, Sansa saw that Gendry and the small group he had brought from the Autumn lands had moved out of the way, making room for the Summer court to be announced.

Scanning the group for her brother, Sansa only realized what was happening when the attendant spoke again, sounding slightly annoyed that he hadn’t gotten a chance to announce the Autumn court properly.

“Introducing, Tyrion Lannister, the representative from the Summer court.”

Everyone froze.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Margaery so much, I may write something about Sansa/Margaery at some point. Also again, age gaps aren't a thing because everyone is immortal, so lets all not think too hard about Robin and Margaery getting married.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion and Margaery talk

His eyes had found Sansa the second he had entered. Watched her face light up as she saw her little sister, and then fall when she saw him.

He had known she expected Bran, and that his presence would not make up for her brother’s absence. In the end, he wasn’t family, and before anything else, the Starks would prioritize family. Seeing as Sansa was now the head of the family, it would make sense that she took that seriously. 

He hadn’t even known he had wished for more until he got less. It was only when she made eye contact with him that she pulled her face into cool indifference. 

It took her only a second to process what was happening, and she stepped forward.

“Welcome, Lord Tyrion.” Hearing her voice, something settled in Tyrion. 

“Your grace.” He bowed his head forward. Looking down at his saddle for a moment he couldn’t stop himself from trying to salvage the situation, trying to make Sansa’s first thought upon seeing him something other than disappointment. “It has been a long time since a Lannister has stayed at Winterfell, I hope to improve our reputation in my time here.”

He had meant to make a joke, he truly had, but he saw in the way all the lords and ladies around Sansa straightened, that it had not landed.

Sansa herself let a cold smile touch her lips. “Refraining from any attempts on my sibling's lives will be enough.”

Taking her sister’s hand, she turned. Leading the Winter courts with her back into the castle. 

As the cloaked figures filed away, servants moved forward, preparing to lead the guests to their quarters. 

Stablehands approached him and Tyrion dismounted, carefully, finding himself facing Margaery as soon as he was down. 

“Walk with me, Lord Tyrion?” She smiled easily and he nodded. When a servant approached to lead them to Tyrion’s quarters, she waved them away.

“Your Grace, it is good to see you looking so well.” Tyrion complimented cautiously.

“Thank you.” She nodded in acknowledgement more than appreciation, clearly having something else on her mind. She waited to speak again until they had entered the building and most of the attendants had split off. “I have loved Sansa for a long time, did you know that Tyrion?”

Tyrion almost visibly reacted but kept walking. “I can’t say I did.”

Margaery nodded. “I may always love her. She loves me too.”

Tyrion looked around the hallway, trying to find a way out of the situation, but he hadn’t been to Winterfell in too long, he didn’t remember the layout well enough to excuse himself. Letting out a long breath he forced himself to look up at her. “Is there a reason you’re telling me this?”

“Yes, you see I married.”

“I was at your wedding.” He added on unnecessarily.

“Yes, I am quite happy with the arrangement. Robyn is a good man, and I enjoy being the queen of the Spring courts.” She explained.

“The position suits you.” As with his last compliment, the words washed over Margaery with only a smile of acknowledgment.

“Would you answer a question for me, Tyrion?” Tyrion’s gaze sharpened at her request. It was an unusual one, intimate for a person he barely knew. Unable to lie, or break a vow, any request was something that warranted concern, but such a vague one was dangerous.

“Yes.” He said it because he knew if his father was still alive, it would have made him furious.

“What is the biggest flaw of the Tyrell house, and the Stark family?” She asked, looking straight forward.

Tyrion’s eyebrows pulled together, thinking for a moment. “The Tyrell’s are too ambitious, and the Stark’s are too honourable.”

Margaery looked down at him smiling. “I always knew you were clever. What do you think would happen if a Tyrell had to choose between power and security and an unstable position with no real ability to grow?”

“They would choose power, I would assume.” He answered cautiously.

“You would assume correctly. Now, what would happen if a Stark had to choose between her desires, and honouring an oath, even if the oath was not her own.” She continued and Tyrion finally caught on.

“She would be alone.” He answered, ignoring the pretense.

Margaery seemed pleased.

For a moment he entertained the idea of holding his cards to his chest, but he couldn’t see a reason to. She had revealed enough in this conversation to ensure she wouldn’t be bringing it up to anyone else for fear he may do the same. “Is the flaw of the Lannister house not that they are possessive?”

“Yes.” His question didn’t seem to phase her. “But you are cleverer than most Lannister’s. You know better than to try and tame a wolf.”

Tyrion could not think of a response to her, so he didn’t say anything, just walking with her for a while. After a few minutes he looked around him, eyebrows furrowing. 

“Is my bedroom close?” He asked, and it seemed like he was about to receive his answer as Margaery approached a door.

“Yes, six doors back to the left.” She answered slipping into her quarter’s, closing the door firmly behind her.


End file.
